That’s a good point. If I remember correctly, optane has a operating mode where the memory is only meant to be used as RAM. It’s stored on the non-volatile RAM

That’s a good point. If I remember correctly, optane has a operating mode where the memory is only meant to be used as RAM. It’s stored on the non-volatile RAM in an encrypted form and the key is intentionally discarded/lost when rebooted. Another obvious operating mode is to make the NVRAM be the first line of swap and have things spill from DRAM into NVRAM when there is memory pressure. I think Intel also offered a mode like this, where it made everything look like DRAM and it would spill onto NVRAM as it needed to. Of course, this would be better rolled into the OS or application level so smarter decisions can be made, but given very high NVRAM densities it’s a great application for the technology.